


That Wasn't an Order

by mangojuice



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ella Enchanted Fusion, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, I WILL ADD TAGS AS NEEDED, Light Angst, M/M, i dont know guys its wild
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-04-14
Packaged: 2018-10-18 21:36:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10625616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mangojuice/pseuds/mangojuice
Summary: That was the power of the “gift”. Everything felt out of his control, even the things he wouldn't have had control over in the first place.~~~~~~~~Dex had been given the gift of obedience, and after he's lost close to everything he's decided it's about time to go find Kent and make him take the curse back. Of course, that's easier said than done when you have a talking book as your guide, a lawyer elf, and a crown prince, along with his two guards for company. Here we go, yall.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! Its my first long fic, and my first nurseydex fic. Let me know what you think!  
> Im still in need of a beta for future chapters, so if you're willing message me on tumblr and I will be eternally grateful!! :)

Mother was ill, she was very very ill, and Dex didn’t know what to do.

Dex begged her to get better, gripped her hand with tears in his eyes and commanded her to get better, hoping with everything he had that she would obey, just like he had to, and color would magically reappear in her cheeks and she would get up, gather him close and kiss his hair like she always did. But she didn’t, she continued to lay in her bed and in a weak voice tell Dex that no one knew about his obedience, that he could never tell anyone about his gift, his curse, his burden. 

Even on her deathbed his mother was always looking out for the wellbeing of her son, she didn’t want people to use Dex’s curse against him. He already had such a hard time trying to be his own person when he had to do everything he was told.

Dex nodded, clenched his free hand into a tight fist and tried to swallow down the large lump in his throat. It made it hard to breath, choking back his tears and trying to convey to his mom how much he loved her. He wanted to beg her once again to get better, to not die and leave him here alone with only Bitty to confide in, but he knew that it would only make things harder. 

He knew deep down that his mother didn’t want to pass away when Dex was so young, but he could only feel sorrow and anger. Anger at the illness that had been consuming his mother’s health for weeks now, and sorrow at the fact that there was no way to fix it.

That was the power of the “gift”. Everything felt out of his control, even the things he wouldn't have had control over in the first place. Some masochistic part of him told him that without the curse, he could have stopped his mother’s death.

Dex didn’t let the tears fall until he was surrounded by the safety of his room, after he had said his goodbye and mother had gingerly placed her round pendant necklace in his palm. He turned it over in his hand, feeling the chain run smooth across his fingers and sighed. It was a simple design, gold and a heavyweight in his hand, but the meaning behind it was anything but simple. Placing the necklace around his neck, he got up, dried his cheeks off and quickly changed for bed. He would need to help pick flowers for the funeral tomorrow.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

“You’re married?!” Dex’s father looked just as shocked by Dex’s outburst as Dex was by the news. 

“She has money, Dex. It was marry her, or lose the house. It will be fine, and I’m sure you’ll get along swimmingly with Dame Agnes’ two daughters,”

Dex doubted that, but he hadn’t met the girls yet, so he gave his father a wry smile, smoothed out his vest and took a deep breath in, preparing to meet his new siblings. The sound of a horse carriage brought their attention to the front yard.

“Oh boy.” Dex quietly muttered to himself before pushing the door open to let his father out ahead of him.

Outside, an ornately dressed woman was looking around at the yard, clearly unimpressed. Two girls stood behind her, whispering to each other. Dex couldn't quite make out what they were saying, but he thought he heard “dump”, “shack”, and “garbage can”.

“Hello, I’m Dex,” He gave a shallow bow and a shy smile their way. “Welcome to Frell!” He inwardly cringed when the two tittered and pushed past him into the house. Well, he couldn't say he didn’t try. But if his new sisters didn’t want to be friendly towards him that was fine.

It wasn’t like Dex himself was labelled as some sort of saint, anyone from town could tell you about the temper that he had. Short and fiery, he didn’t bother trying to play nice. If people didn’t want to be near him it was a-okay. It made the curse somewhat bearable if no one stuck around long enough to order him to do anything. He helped the coachmen carry in the (quite frankly large and numerous bags) inside to the girls’ room and thanked them with a firm handshake. And of course Dex wasn’t surprised when the eldest, Katie, had begun pulling out large posters of Prince Derek and tacking them on the wall. Dex couldn’t conceal his discontempt even if he tried.

“You do know that the prince’s uncle is responsible for the segregation of the kingdom, right?” He raised his eyebrows at the two, who both turned to give him incredulous looks.

“So? He’s dreamy,” Katie sighed, gazing lovingly at one of the posters.

“Katie’s president of his fan club!” Sarah squealed.

Dex let out a scoff. Of course these girls wouldn’t even care about the state of the kingdom, the segregation and restriction of freedom for ogres, elves, and giants. How ridiculous of him to think that they might care about more important things than how cute the Prince is and the size of their closet. 

“We’ll just have to use yours!” Katie exclaimed when she saw Sarah and her’s shared closet, and Dex tried to sputter out a polite no. “Well come on, show it to us,” Katie waved her arms at Dex, and just like every other time, Dex had no choice but to straighten out his back and swiftly walk down the hall to show them his closet, and just like every other time, Dex was angry that someone made him do something he didn’t want to do. He was going to lose his closet space! These girls had been here barely an hour and Dex knew that his already short fuse was going to shrink, and fast.

The commenting on his ‘dreary’ bedroom was not helping. Katie turned to Dex, telling him that he had to move his clothes out of his closet to make room for their - honestly excessive amount of - clothing, and noticed his pendant. “Ohh,” She cooed over the small piece of jewelry, “I actually quite like this.” Dex quickly placed a hand over his collarbone, where the pendant had laid against his chest for years.

“Please don’t touch it, it was my mother’s.” His hand stayed where it was, trying to shield it away from Katie’s leering gaze.

“Can I have it?” 

“No,” Dex barked out. He heard Katie give a disappointed noise, but Dex was too concerned with begging whatever higher power there was that she wouldn’t demand he give her the necklace. Father had locked away most of mother’s things after the funeral, and besides, Dex had been given the pendant by his mother, and it was his most prized possession. He couldn’t bear to have to give it away.

But of course, the universe wasn’t kind to Dex, and not even a second later he was ripping the necklace off and presenting it to Katie for her to take. Dex could feel his ears burning red and anger bubbling in his chest.

Leaving the girls, who were busy upturning his closet, he went out the back door and swung open the big barn doors. Dex quickly started his chores, losing himself in the familiar routine, trying to calm the anger threatening to spill over. Not for the first time, Dex felt like punching everything into oblivion over something bad the curse had made him do, and maybe he was overreacting a little but he was so tired of constantly having no say in what his own body does, always having to comply to whatever he was told by whoever told him to do it.

Dex sighed and shook his head, clearing his head of any lingering stormy thoughts and got to work on his chores.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Chowder and Dex had already painted their protest signs in preparation for Prince Derek’s mall opening. They were probably going to be the only ones there against the so called dreamy prince, but it didn’t make much difference in Dex’s mind. Someone needed to be a voice to those who had a fear of speaking out. Dex had risen early that morning, finished his chores in record time, and then changed out of his work clothes. He shoved his protest sign into his leather saddlebag and bounded down the stairs.

“And just where where do you think you're going?” He froze and turned towards the house fairy standing in the kitchen doorway.

“Hi Bitty! Chowder and I are going to the mall opening. You know how he is, he’s a social creature. Likes to know about all the things going on in the community and I said I would tag along.” He nodded along with his story, smiling in what he hoped was a convincing way, hiking his saddle bag a little higher up on his shoulder.

Bitty raised a sculpted eyebrow his way, but didn’t press the matter. He gave a shrug and pushed off the doorway, walking towards Dex. He pushed back some of the hair flopping on his forehead and gave his arm a little squeeze. “Well, why don’t you grab some mini pies on your way out, hon? I made some peach and apple, and lord knows that your step sisters and their mother won’t eat any,” Bitty gave Dex a smile, and Dex found comfort in knowing that whenever he thought of anything, Bitty was there, a constant and steady figure in his life. 

Bitty beckoned Dex over to the kitchen, where he wrapped up two mini pies in paper and handed them over to Dex. Dex squeezed Bitty into a hug, dashed to the doorway, swung the door open, and made his way down the path. 

Dex had been walking down the dirt road for ten minutes when he finally reached Chowder’s small cottage. Walking up to the door he gave three loud knocks, and waited for Chowder to come to the door. The door opened with a bang and Chowder’s bright face was screaming out a goodbye to his family. He flew past Dex and down the path, already babbling on about how excited he was. Dex grinned and let out a laugh at his enthusiasm, running after Chowder and putting a hand on his shoulder to slow him down.

“Bitty made us mini pies,” Dex said, opening up the paper package. Chowder squealed in delight, and Dex could almost see the stars twinkling in his eyes over his favorite peach mini pies. Chowder snatched up his pie, and before Dex could even grab his own Chowder had gobbled his treat down in two large bites, crumbs sticking to the corner of his mouth as he continued to chomp away. Dex ate his own pie slowly, then crumpled up the paper wrapping and stuffed it in his bag, turning to Chowder to see him wiping at his face, trying to expel the remaining pie filling.

“Did I get it?” Chowder asked Dex. He was still wiping at the wrong side of his face, trying to clean up his appearance, and Dex shook his head, a fond smile growing on his face. He pointed to where the crumbs were on his face, and watched as Chowder finally brushed away the pie remnants. He smiled bright at Dex, and talked on about how he had been annoying his family all morning talking about the mall opening. Dex listened intently, and hummed and nodded, and smiled encouragingly in all the right places. 

Chowder was Dex's best friend, and had been ever since they were kids. Dex had bitten this rotten little boy for making fun of Chowder’s name and the fact that he was Ayorthaian, and Chowder and him had been close ever since. Chowder had been there for him through everything, and even though he didn’t know about Dex’s curse, Dex felt that Chowder still understood him like only Bitty and his mother could. 

When Dex's mother had died, he mostly had to mourn alone. Father was away on business trips trying to make ends meet, and it wasn’t like Dex was all buddy-buddy with any of his classmates, so when Chowder came over a week after the funeral and let Dex sob on his shoulder, he had felt a weight lift from his shoulders. It had gotten even lighter when Chowder sang a traditional Ayorthaian mourning song for Dex, and then he felt like not even the curse could keep his tears at bay.

They finally reached town after walking for another twenty minutes, and strolled through the mall marveling at the variety of shops that never failed to delight the two, Chowder shaking Dex’s arm at every remotely cool thing he saw. Being relatively poor, the two couldn't help gawking at the frivolous items a richer man might've bought without a second thought.

Dex could hear the screaming throng of girls just up ahead, and pulled Chowder along into the middle of the square, pulling out his protest sign from his bag, making sure it was still rolled up neatly. Chowder stood up behind him with his own sign, and they both waited for the Prince to come out before unfurling their signs and shouting out.

“SAY NO TO OGRECIDE!”

“STOP THE GIANT LAND GRAB!”

“SAY NO TO OGRECIDE!”

“STOP THE GIANT LAND GRAB!”

Chowder had grown serious when Dex had begun shouting. They both knew how important this protest was, even with just the two of them and a slim chance of being heard, they were determined to do everything they could to help the minorities of the kingdom.

Dex knew on some level that Prince Derek was not oblivious to his uncle’s actions, and Dex was sure that once he took the crown changes would be made for the better. But what Dex didn't understand was why there were no changes being made now. Maybe Prince Derek just didn't know about the extent of the damage, carefully kept away from his view by order of his uncle. Whatever the case, Dex knew he wasn't the one who needed to take responsibility.  
It looked as if they're shouting was reaching the Prince over the throng of screaming girls, his head looking for the source of the protest, when Katie crudely ripped the sign from his hands. He gasped in shock and looked up to give her a scorching glare.  
“What are you doing?!” She glanced around, no doubt making sure that no one was seeing her interact with Dex. Turning back towards him she fixed him with a stern gaze. “Go home now.”

Dex had no choice but to stammer out an apology to a confused Chowder and walk towards home, fuming silently. 

He was back on the dirt road in no time, shoving his sign back into his saddlebag, he would try to use it again another time. He let out a frustrated growl, kicking at the dirt with his boots. He suspected that Katie knew something wasn’t quite right with Dex, but Dex figured that Katie and Sarah had a few too many screws loose to actually figure it all out. Definitely Sarah did. The girl was a downright dolt. He was exhausted, doing everything the girls told him to. His father needed money for the house, sure, but he couldn’t have picked a wealthy women who didn’t have annoying daughters hell-bent on making his life challenging? His internal ranting was coming to a head when his body was suddenly forced to the ground by another person.

Dex was ready to shout in protest when a stern voice whispered “Be quiet,” and a large hand clamped down over his mouth.

Dex turned to give his captor an authentic William Poindexter Glare, but instead, his eyes widened. He was face-to-face with Prince Derek Malik Nurse.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm mangojuicyy on tumblr, come and say hi!


End file.
